Professor Dr. Stefan Pfister was appointed head of the Division Pediatric Neurooncology at the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) in 2012. Being a pediatrician by training, Professor Dr. Pfister received his MD from Tübingen University, and his clinical education at Mannheim and Heidelberg University Hospitals.
As a physician-scientist, he completed postdoctoral fellowships with Christopher Rudd at the Dana-Faber Cancer Institute/Harvard Medical School, and with Peter Lichter at the German Cancer Research Center, Division of Molecular Genetics.
Professor Dr. Pfister´s research focuses on the genetic and epigenetic characterization of childhood brain tumors by applying nextgeneration profiling methods and subsequently translating novel findings into a clinical context. This might be achieved by establishing prognostic biomarkers and classification systems, by identifying new drug targets and genetic cancer predispositions, or by providing models for preclinical drug testing.
For his translational neurooncology projects, Professor Dr. Pfister received several prestigious awards, including the Kind-Philipp Award for Pediatric Oncology 2009, the Alfred-Müller Award for Neurooncology in 2011, and the German Cancer Award in 2012. Together with Peter Lichter he is currently conducting the whole-genome sequencing part of the PedBrainTumor project, the first German contribution to the International Cancer Genome Consortium (ICGC), in which whole genome sequencing is being performed on 600 tumor and 600 normal samples. Amongst others, Professor Dr. Pfister is also coordinating the BMBF-funded project “Molecular diagnostics in medulloblastoma”, which aims to prospectively validate a number of highly promising molecular biomarkers in this aggressive childhood brain tumor for future clinical application.